give me your eyes, i need sunshine
by freewithme
Summary: AU. "Daddy, what is this?" she asks, putting the CD on top of his desk. [Complete]


For Sarah/seamountain. I hope this is at least a little bit of what you had in mind, darling. :)

Warning: major character death.

* * *

 **give me your eyes, i need sunshine  
**

* * *

 _Take bread away from me, if you wish,_

 _take air away, but_

 _do not take from me your laughter._

 _(Pablo Neruda)_

 _~.~_

 **December, 2030.**

When they were 22, young, and stupid, they broke up. It wasn't anything like their high school break ups, it didn't last a week or three days, like some of those did. It lasted four, almost five years. 1792 days to be exact. 1792 days of not speaking or seeing each other.

When Finn's thinking about it and he's not hurt or emotional or anything; when he's just being reasonable, he thinks it really was for the better. He was working long hours trying to get a promotion at work. He was so tired of being a substitute teacher and with a degree in hand he was eligible for a new contract, so he threw himself into his work, spending all of his free time researching and taking different courses that could help him have an edge on any other possible candidates. A teacher's life, by definition, is already hard work because you never leave your work at the work place, there's always something more to do. When you put all that together, plus the added pressure, a disaster around the corner is pretty much a safe bet.

Rachel was also working hard. She was on an Off-Off-Broadway play and finishing University at the same time. Balancing both took a tool on her and she stretched herself too thin; she was always in a rush, always getting ready for something, always late for something else, her rehearsal schedule was absolutely all over the place. She was working hard, and staying in the theatre until midnight could be called a good day.

It ended up being incredibly taxing on their relationship. A relationship by itself takes a lot of work, but when you throw in ambitions, school, and work in the mix, it's only time before something breaks. The weakest link. Now, Finn doesn't like to think their relationship was the weakest link because that might seem like their relationship wasn't strong enough, which it was. But it just… happened.

And it was painful. It certainly wasn't fun.

Break-ups are never fun, but taking into account the context, it was actually one of the worst experiences of Finn's life. And that's saying something. He didn't mean to throw those words at Rachel's face, calling her names and receiving the same treatment back. Expectedly, of course. It's only the reasonable defence mechanism anyway. Hurtful words were said and certain parts of their argument would stay in their memories for far too many years after it happened, like a bad fresh tattoo you can't get rid of, it's just stuck in your skin and it hurts when you move and it makes you want to go down on your knees and cry when you look at it. Misery was a good word to describe it.

Sometimes Finn looks back and sighs, regret pouring through his pores. When Rachel was still around for those moments, she would shake her head and tell him everything has a reason, everything has a meaning and nothing in life is just random or accidental, everything has a purpose.

She would say, "And our purpose was to grow up so we could be together, Finn."

Well, he's definitely anxiously waiting for someone to explain to him the purpose of _this_. This pain that doesn't seem to fade or go away no matter what he tries to do. Even in his dreams the aching is still present, every single night. If he thought that break-up was torment, this is pure torture. It's just as constant as waves crashing into the shore. It never ends.

* * *

 _"Love doesn't die with death. Love is like liquid; when it pours out, it seeps into others' lives. Love changes form and shape. Love gets into everything. Death doesn't conquer all; love does. Love wins every single time. Love wins by lasting through death. Love wins by loving more, loving again, loving without fear."_

 _(Kate O'Neill)_

 _~.~_

 **Summer of 2037**

Penelope likes to play with Rachel's clothes and objects. She likes to dig through her stuff and find hidden gems and she can honestly stay hours searching through a single box. Finn has seen it happen more times than he can count. It's her favourite Saturday activity and not even her friends or cousins calling and texting for her to go hang out diverge her from it. Finn can't blame her. After all, it's hard to break tradition. She's twelve and stability is important right now because, you know, those hormones certainly throw her out of her game more often that she could ever care for. She got her period two months ago, and a pimple showed up on her face last week. She needs something she can rely on. Something that won't go change.

Something perpetual.

Today she has one of Rachel's pink t-shirts on as she goes through her mother's stuff. It has a cat face printed on it and there are golden stars all over the cat's face. Finn smiles when he sees it, remembering the day when he was 16 and didn't know what to get for Rachel's birthday until his mom found this t-shirt and told him it would make a good present. Rachel loved it. She made sure to wear it every single Friday, telling Finn she wanted to end the school week with a bang and, apparently, a smiley kitten was just the way to make her happy for the weekend.

The little things. The little things made her happy.

Penelope is curved over a certain box and her small hands are rummaging through it. She has a concentrated look on her face as her hand moves around, pulling a few items from the box and sets them by her side. Looking at his daughter, Finn's back kind of hurts a little from watching her in such position. He asks her if back is not hurting from sitting on the floor like that and she brushes him off, like she always does. They have the same conversation every Saturday afternoon.

"Daddy, it doesn't hurt, I promise."

He can't help but give her some unsolicited advice. He would be half ashamed and back off, but his grey hairs totally justify his behaviour. "You'll regret that when you're a little older, Nell."

She makes this sound like she's sort of bored with the conversion and Finn gets the hint. He shakes his head and laughs a little, giving her space and time she wants to explore her mom's stuff.

* * *

 _She's the tear that hangs inside my soul forever._

 _(Jeff Buckley)_

 _~.~_

 **19th of July, 2037 _._**

Penelope finds an old CD.

She's sitting on the floor wearing Finn's old football jersey from McKinley and going through Rachel's stuff and she finds it. This round thing that's kind of weird, she can't exactly recognise it. It has a white side that has the words " ** _one of those days (may, 2016)_** " written on it with her mother's perfect calligraphy. The other side is kind of like a bad mirror with a few thin lines all over it. It kind of has different colours, too, depending on how she angles it. She moves it around, trying to figure out what it is before getting up and going to Finn's study.

Whenever she finds something new, she always tries to figure out what it is before asking Finn. Finn likes to brag to everyone who'll hear that his baby girl will be the best scientist ever some day because of her inquisitive and investigative mind.

"Daddy, what is this?" she asks, putting the CD on top of his desk.

Finn pushes the papers he's grading aside and picks it up. He reads Rachel's words and his breath is caught up in his throat for a moment. It says May of 2016, about a month after they broke up, all those years ago. Decades, really. He blinks and shakes his head a little, shaking the thoughts away from his mind. "This is a CD, honey."

"What's a CD?"

"You know how you listen to songs in your phone?" She nods. "We used to use this little thing to listen to songs."

"Oh! Really?!"

Finn manages a little smile, the look of excitement on her face super cute, enough for him to stop being sad.

"Wanna listen?" Finn offers. "I think I have an old CD player in the garage."

"Do you think it's Mommy singing? I thought I had all of her songs _and_ covers on my computer."

"I don't know, could be." Finn shrugs. "Let's check it out?"

Penelope quickly nods, an enthusiastic smile on her face at the prospect of finding new (old) songs sang in Mommy's voice. Those are never a disappointment and she loves it because Mommy's voice is the prettiest voice of all the voices. Ever.

She follows Finn to the garage, her hands clinging the CD close to her chest. She watches him search through a few boxes, opening them and taking a look inside. He pulls out a square black object with a couple of wires hanging off the back. He gives her a small smile and asks her to go with him to the living room. He sets everything up and turns it on. Penelope hands the CD to her father and he presses a button, making a small drawer open up. She gasps, never seeing anything like it and Finn has to chuckles at her face. He feels kind of old that his daughter doesn't even know what a stereo – or a CD – is.

He puts the CD on and presses play. After a few seconds, they can hear a soft acoustic guitar being played. Finn holds his breath, knowing that Rachel only played the guitar when she was feeling particularly melancholic. He hopes this is a mix CD and not actually Rachel singing.

He tries to be subtle about his feelings because he does not want to cry in front of his daughter right now. This is not the time.

It takes a little while, but then Rachel's voices flows through the living room.

 _i still remember the look on your face / lit through the darkness at 1:58 / the words that you whispered for just us to know / you told me you loved me / so why did you go / away?_

Penelope gasps at the sound, her chocolate eyes wide as she drops to her knees and gets closer to the stereo, a look of pure wonder on her face as she listens to Rachel's voice. She delicately reaches her small hands and rests them on top of the stereo.

Finn covers his mouth with his hand as he closes his eyes, he can't listen or see this right now. He can't listen to Rachel's voice as she expresses the raw and fresh pain of their break-up, and he can't watch his daughter as she adoringly gazes at the stereo, extremely happy to be listening to her mother's voice. Finn can feel the pain beating along with his heart, every beat spreading it all over his body and he has to sit down, his legs are shaking.

 _i do recall now / the smell of the rain / fresh on the pavement / i ran off the plane / that july 9th / the beat of your heart / it jumps through your shirt / i can still feel your arms_

Penelope, completely unaware of what's happening to her father, turns around and whispers, "Daddy… prettiest voice, right?"

Finn blinks quickly a few times and swallows the huge lump on his throat. "Yes, Princess," he chokes out, his voice raspy from barely contained reaction. "The prettiest voice." His daughter is so enthralled by her mother's voice, she doesn't even register Finn's tone.

(Thankfully.)

The song goes on, every word falling from 22 year old Rachel Berry's lip telling a story that he would have much preferred it never happened in the first place. Clearly, this is not of those reasonable times.

 _but now i'll go sit on the floor / wearing your clothes / all that i know is that / i don't know how to be something you miss_

There's a small, barely-there gasp in Rachel's voice, but Finn obviously can tell, he _knows_ Rachel. And he _knows_ she was silently crying. His brain is in havoc right now, trying to search for a memory of a time when he listened to this song. He needs to know if he can handle it. He needs to know he's not going to be a sobbing mess in front of his daughter in a sunny July afternoon.

 _never thought we'd have a last kiss…_

Even though he braces himself for whatever's coming, it doesn't work. At all. Hearing Rachel's hurting through her voice is more than enough for him. He doesn't know to deal with the foreboding of her words and how true they are. He tries to think about their actual last kiss and he can't remember. He can't remember it and this hurts so much, he needs to get out of this room.

He hastily gets up, Penelope looking over her shoulder, catching only the glimpse of him slipping out of the room.

 _never imagined we'd end like this / your name, forever the name on my lips_

Finn walks through the first floor aimlessly, sluggishly pressing his hands over the wall as he tries to maintain his balance. His head is spin at one hundred miles per hour and he can't breathe.

He hears the music getting louder, Penelope raising the volume to fully hear her mother's words and this is like a whole new level of pain, it never felt like this before. It's like someone pulled the heart from his chest and they're beating it with a hammer right in front of him and there's nothing he can do. There's nothing he can do to stop it. His chest tightens and he feels a huge weight falling down on his.

Scrambling his way up the stairs, he heads to his (their) bedroom, entering the room and pushing the door behind him. It doesn't actually close, but he doesn't want to think about that right now. He can't… he can't even think. He sits on the bed, his hands cradling his head as he tries to take deep breaths, the songs continues filtering through the house and Finn can't take this anymore, he closes his eyes as a painful sob rips through him.

~.~

They're having dinner in the dining room and Finn can tell Penelope has something she wants to say to him. She keeps chewing on the corner of her bottom lip just like Rachel used to do when she was thinking hard about something. He wants to tell her she can talk to him about anything, whenever she wants and she doesn't have to be afraid of it, but he selfishly can't bring himself to do it because he has an idea what this is about and he's not exactly ready to have a heavy conversation over baked pollock and potato sad. He's biting into his fish when her small voice asks, "Daddy?"

Her eyes are wide and open and she looks so much like her mom that it's almost enough to bring Finn to his knees and make him cry. Well, if he hadn't cried all his tears earlier today, that is.

"Yes, baby?"

She takes a deep breath and Finn knows this is hard for her, too. At least he's alone in this. He reaches over the table and circles her tiny hands in his large ones, squeezing them softly to make her comfortable.

"Well, I've been googling a few things…" she says softly as she stares down at her plate. "And after I listened to Mommy's song today, I went to Aunt Mercedes' house and we talked."

Finn swallows hard at her words. "Yeah?"

"We talked a lot. And because I love you so much I want you to know something, Daddy." She looks up at him and blinks a couple of times before speaking again. Finn can't stop staring at her when she utters the words in a quiet, but firm voice, "It's okay to love again. Daddy, I just want you to be happy. And I'm sure that's what Mommy wants, too."

Tears start welling in both of their eyes at her words. Finn pushes his chair back from the table at the same time Penelope jumps out of her chair and goes to him, throwing herself at his open arms. She hugs him tighter than she ever did and Finn lets a few drops fall into her hair as he clings to her small body for dear life.

* * *

 _I want  
to do with you what spring does with the cherry trees._

 _(Pablo Neruda)_

 _~.~_

 **First day of school, autumn of 2038.**

Finn's drinking his regular bottle of cold water in the teacher's lounge before classes when the new teacher walks into the room. He heard about her before. He remembers a conversation with Artie about their school fighting with a few other schools in the island for her when she moved from Chicago because she's just _that_ good, but they haven't had the opportunity of meeting her yet.

She's absolutely beautiful. He tries to look away from her and not be a total creep, but it's like there's something pulling his attention to her presence and he can't deflect his gaze. The more he looks at her, the more stunning she is.

He watches her going to talk to Matt and when she smiles, he swears the entire atmosphere of the room shifts and everything seems brighter.

Matt walks with her through the room and introduces her to everyone. They're getting closer to where Finn is sitting and his heart starts beating really fast. His hands feel sweaty and he tries to swallow the lump in his throat so he can, you know, actually _talk_ to this woman. She's stunning and even looking at her makes his insides twirl.

Ever since his conversation with Penelope last summer, things have been different. For both of them, really. He explained to her that he's not unhappy with his life, but then she went ahead and told him she doesn't think he's the happiest he could be either. He would doubt such insightful words came out of her mouth, but then he remembers she's Rachel Berry's daughter and the real shock would be if she wasn't super smart. It's like the Berry family is inherently emotional intelligent.

Penelope is not exactly pushing him to be with other women, but sometimes they're walking down Central Park and she'll point at some random woman and say, "Isn't she pretty, Daddy?" At first he was a bit uncomfortable with discussing this with his daughter of all people and would only chuckle a bit and respond, "Not as pretty as Mommy, sweetheart." She'd make this noise like _obviously_ no other woman is as pretty as her mom and would try to turn his attention to another passing woman.

He got used to it eventually and after talking it out with Ethan and his therapist, he decided to embrace Penelope's idea. It was about time he tried to find someone again. And he knew Rachel; she would certainly want him to be happy. The happiest he could be. It still felt weird to even glance at other women, but when he took his ring off it got somehow easier. It finally didn't feel like he was doing something wrong. So he went on a couple of dates, but he never felt anything, not even a tickle on his stomach or anything like that.

Until now.

Matt finally reaches his table and smiles at him. Finn gets up from his seat because he's not some uneducated ass or anything. He waits for one of them to say something. Matt points to the woman and says, "Finn, this is the new English teacher."

Finn gives the woman (and Matt, but yeah, mostly the woman) a small dimpled grin and he's not exactly sure, but he could swear her smile gets bigger when he does it. Her eyes are sparkling and huge and they're totally demanding his attention. He honestly doesn't mind giving it to her.

Wait.

That sounded dirty.

But seriously, he wouldn't mind giving it to her either way. Dirty or not. Okay, he really needs to stop thinking about _that_ right now at the teacher's lounge on a Monday morning.

Completely unaware of his internal rambling, or super awesome at disguising her face, the woman looks at him in the eyes and says, "Hi, I'm Santana Lopez."

Finn shakes her soft hand in his and forgets to say something for a moment, a little too excited at be touching this beautiful woman in front of him. Matt gives him a weird look and he quickly recovers, blinking away his signature awkwardness. Shaking her hand back, he says, "Nice to meet you, Santana. I'm Finn Hudson."

She repeats his name back at him and he figures it's her way of memorising everyone's name on her first day. When she says it, he swears… he hasn't heard anything this sexy in a really, really long time. And it's just his name. Like, he's used to it by now. But it still brings a thrill at the pit of his stomach, which is filled with butterflies by now.

He gives her a grin and thinks he can't wait to see what this year is going to bring him.

~.~

Fin.

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Title comes from Wolf Parade's "I'll Believe in Anything". I don't own _Last Kiss_ by Taylor Swift, Google or any other brands mentioned in this story.

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 **Thank you for reading. :)**


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